I'm gonna go ahead and write some pretty personal stuff now. I use this blog as a journal more than anything anyway. So to those of you who read it, you're reading my diary now. :]
I have had to make some pretty tough decisions lately. I know that parenting does that to you, and I know that I have no idea what "tough" means at this point, but they are meaningful either way. Growing up I always dreamed about having kids and how much fun that would be and how cool it would feel to have created something so special with the love of my life. I never really thought about the important stuff though, like what to feed him. Since I've joined the church I feel that the need to breast feed is almost overwhelming. It helps you stay self-sufficient and self-reliant. It allows you more opportunity to be spontaneous. And it provides a bond between mother and child that is indescribable. And sure, everyone tells you all of this during your pregnancy and even those first few days in the hospital they do all they can to ensure you're breastfeeding your child. But nobody ever tells you how hard it is. Or how painful it can be. Every book I've read about the topic says "breastfeeding shouldn't hurt." Bull. Think about it. That baby has better suction than any vacuum and he applies it to the most tender part of your body. My son can hold up a 9 ounce tall bottle just by his mouth. Then there's the whole thing about milk coming in. So during my pregnancy I tried to prepare myself for what I felt I needed to do. I know that breast is best and it would definitely be most helpful to not have to buy formula. Right after I gave birth to Ivan, I started nursing him. The nurses weren't as helpful as I'd hoped and I'm pretty shy about my body. Then one nurse came in, and instead of helping me do it myself, she decided I needed a special appliance to allow me to nurse my son. She gave me a shield and everything worked fine after that. . . For a couple days. I thought this shield was a temporary thing, just to help Ivan understand a little better that milk does come from there. Well, turns out he made it permanent. Every time I would try to nurse him, I would try without the shield and he would never latch, so I would have to pump and feed him from a bottle or use the shield after all. How dumb is that? I'm pretty upset by it. Using that thing hurts and makes it so much harder to feed him, especially in the middle of the night. I can't nurse in any other position than sitting up and he refuses to nurse without the shield. Then I had to go back to work. Not just because we're poor, but I seem to thrive on human interaction and being able to mentally and physically challenge myself. My job accomplishes all of those things, and if it means Michael has to watch Ivan by himself a couple hours out of the day and we have to have a baby sitter sometimes, then I'm ok with that. They are fully competent people and it keeps me sane. But pumping at work and storing the milk and all the extra frustration that goes along with that, not to mention the time I have to take out of work to go sit in the bathroom for 20 minutes. It's just a little ridiculous. So I needed to make a decision. Do I continue to be the only one getting up in the middle of the night with a hungry baby, do I pump at work, do I continue to use the shield and be incredibly uncomfortable, do I continue with the pain and frustration this is causing me, or should I just wean him now and feed him formula? To be honest I felt a little guilty that I would rather feed my son from a bottle than nurse him. I mean it's not like I'm not feeding him anymore, he's still going to get something to eat. And if babies can thrive on just formula from the beginning, what's the difference anyway? Plus, I was getting really really upset every time he made a single noise that sounded like he might be hungry. I was getting to the point where I was mad at him for being so hungry all the time. And I could never tell if he was getting enough to eat.
So I quit. I'm a quitter. I'm such a good quitter I could smoke a pack a day for 10 years and drop it like cold turkey over night.
And you know what, I'm really happy with my decision. There are days when I wish I would have weaned him a little slower so I could still nurse him every now and then just to remind myself why I quit, but then I remember why I quit. He got 4 weeks of breast milk and I feel good about my decision to switch to formula. Going back to work did influence my decision making a little more, but only in the sense that it made it happen sooner. I would have stopped in January when we went back to school any way. I really can't believe how unhappy that made me. Sure, the baby blues might have gotten to me more then, but the physical discomfort it gave me is cause enough to stop.
Maybe I'll try harder on the next one, but I sure don't feel like a failure with this little guy.
He's gaining an ounce a day without my milk. I do feel a little judged at church when women take their babies to the mothers room (which smells awful at out meeting house) and I pull out a bottle. But everyone has their way of doing things and I'm not going to let what other people do offend me or make me feel bad about myself. Breastfeeding works for some people and doesn't for others. That's why formula was invented. I'm just grateful I live in a day where I have the freedom and opportunity to choose. I love my family, I love my job and I love the gospel. And I'm grateful I've had the opportunity to choose all of those. I know that this particular issue is not the biggest decision I'll have to make, nor is it the biggest I have made, but it was hard for me.
Other hard decisions, like joining the church, continuing to attend church, where to live, who to marry, what to study, how long to go to school, when to replace our cars, what to eat for dinner. . . All those things take a little more effort than the every day decision of what to wear or when to get dressed. All the same, they need to be made. But there's also the decision of whether or not to be offended. I've found I have a few people in my life that I practically need to walk on eggshells around to not offend them. And if they read this and even thought that I partially meant them in any way, they would totally be offended. I love how simply people look at it. They did something mean, it hurt my feelings, now I don't want to talk to them. But how often do they realize that you are the ones that choose what you feel. Maybe you can't always control who you love, like children, you can't help but love them. But when it comes to getting your feelings hurt, you have the choice. This has been on my mind a lot lately. Should I tiptoe around other people's feelings all my life? Or is it their responsibility to man up and try to see things from someone else point of view? I've come to the conclusion that it's both. While I should be mindful that other people have feelings and that I can hurt them, other people should try not to get so easily offended. I know there was a point when I first joined the church that anything anyone said about being in primary got me upset. I didn't know about those things, I didn't have that opportunity growing up. Then there was a time when people thought it was just so cool I was a convert and everyone started any introduction of me with the fact that I am a convert. That ticked me off. Looking back, I see how dumb those things are, and am especially grateful for my circumstances. But knowing that I can get pretty upset about the dumbest, tiniest little thing helps me to realize maybe I just hit a soft spot on someone and I shouldn't let their reaction get to me. By my choice to not get offended I am able to take my emotions into my own hands and allow people some time to explain. Sometimes we say things that are a little too blunt or forward or even unexpected, instead of getting upset, get clarity. I know that learning this lesson now will help me out later with my kids. I can imagine they're going to say or do something super rude to me or someone I love and I'll just have to remind myself that I can choose to be offended or I can choose otherwise. It's up to me. I really just wish other people could that the decision is theirs. Until then, I'll just learn to deal.
Saturday, October 29, 2011
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Our first family adventure
Saturday we were able to enjoy the company of Brenda and Michael's parents for our birthday lunch/dinner. I say "our" because Michael and Brenda are twins and their birthday is the 20th and mine is the 26th. Convenient? I think so. So we all went to Texas Roadhouse, my favorite, and enjoyed eating and visiting with each other. After that, Michael and I decided to go to Sam's club. We just recently got the membership and figured every time we were in Idaho Falls that we would check it out. Plus I bought some green grapes from there a couple weeks ago and they were amazing! Now every time we go, we try to get the same grapes. It has yet to happen. After wandering around Sam's club for a while, we took a nice scenic drive, our first in a couple weeks. And if you know us, you know that's overdue. We drove up to the palisades and visited one of our favorite waterfalls, conveniently called Fall Creek Falls. The creek called Fall Creek cascades over the edge of a cliff and into the Snake River. It's absolutely gorgeous, especially with the leaves changing and it was about sunset too. While we were there admiring the scenery, Michael spotted a moose! Moose are my favorite animals to see in the wild, well except for maybe antelope, but that's because you shouldn't see them in Idaho and Wyoming, you should see them in Africa. Back to the name of Fall Creek Falls. In Tennessee, there is a state park called Fall Creek Falls with 4 or 5 enormous waterfalls all in the same area. It's a really cool place and I thought it was interesting that these two places had the same name. So here's some pictures of our most recent adventure.
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| It's a moose, I swear! |
Sunday, October 23, 2011
20 Questions
My sister-in-law Laura did this on her blog a couple weeks ago and we all found it quite informative. And very entertaining. So per Michael's request, here's my 20 questions about that special someone in my life.
1. Where did you meet?
We met on January 17, 2006 at my older sister's house on Oakdale Dr. in Clarksville, TN. Specifically, in the living room. He was there to teach me and my sister. His missionary companion was Elder Tauiautusa. They rode their bikes over, and it was a really hilly neighborhood and it rained all day, cold, wet, winter rain.
2. What was the first thought that went through your head when you met?
This is going to be interesting. To explain, I had just been baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints on the 14. The 2 missionaries that taught me and baptized me just went home the day or two before and now these 2 new guys were here to teach me and my sister the new member lesson. I wasn't super thrilled that the 2 people I'd grown close to spiritually were gone and now I was supposed to learn from these new guys... Oh and I remember thinking that his voice was a little weird.
3. Do you remember what he/she was wearing?
A suit, I'm pretty sure it was black. And he had black shoes. And his hair was parted and gelled. And he had a name tag.
4.Where was the first time you kissed this person?
In my driveway, leaning against his car on June 14, 2009. He came to visit me after a long distance relationship and getting to know each other through facebook. The visit was to "see some people from his mission" and it really turned out to be whether I was worth him moving out there to marry me. Oh, and I kissed him, for the record. Afterwords, we took a picture together with really goofy, cheesy smiles on our faces. I love that picture.
5. Where did you go for your first date?
It depends on what you consider a date. There were times when we were dating and he was in Idaho and I was in Tennessee that I would set up a blanket outside and talk to him for hours. If that was face to face then that's an awesome date. The first night he was in Tennessee to visit after his mission we went to McGregor Park aka the riverwalk and sat on a bench and chatted for about an hour. But he was super tired after driving 26 hours straight, right after leaving a family reunion, and having not slept for a long time. I think our first date was Tuesday when he picked me up at 6 am, I made him breakfast, we drove to Sewanee, TN and walked around the college campus there (absolutely amazing, every building is like a stone castle), hiked to a natural bridge, found a baby snapping turtle, drove to Alabama to make his roommate jealous, drove to Chattanooga, went to Lookout Mountain, went to Rock City (the gnomes were a little much), and finally ended up at our original destination- the stone door in Grundy County, hiked around there for a while then went to a waterfall he wanted to jump off of while on his mission, he jumped I swam and he almost died. I got home at 11 that night and I hoped that day was the beginning of many more adventures to come. Wow, I'd like to see someone top that for a first date... except he didn't walk me to the door.
6. How long did you know this person before you became a couple?
To be honest, I don't really remember when exactly we "became a couple" the first time... We met in 2006, he was in my ward for 4 months, I saw him once more at a musical fireside and talk for a couple minutes and in 2008 we started talking on facebook in January and maybe in March we started talking on the phone and long distance dating. So I'm gonna say 2 and a quarter years... is that fair?
7. How did he/she ask you out?
I'm pretty sure it was just implied...
8. Has this person ever proposed to you?
Yes, twice. I said no the first time and yes the second. The first time was after we had played soccer and he did something that made me super upset and he was concerned for our relationship. So he bought me ice cream and told me he had the ring with him. I wouldn't even let him talk to me alone. I wanted our proposal story to be better than that. The second time was a winner. I babysat that night and told him to meet me at my house after I got done with work. Then I went to his house and set up flower petals, a picnic on the floor (he had just moved in and had no furniture), and candles. Then he came over and we talked and ate and had fun, and at 3 in the morning on August 16, 2009 he pulled out the ring and said there couldn't be a better time. :]
9. Do you and this person have kids together?
No. We have one kid, and he is perfect.
10.Have you ever broken the law with this person?
Yes. Speeding on a number of occasions, breaking and entering, theft, and a whole bunch of not reporting underage drinking. Not that we were doing it, just not telling on other people doing it.
11. When was the first time you realized you liked this person?
It would have to be when I stuck the shrek candy on my forehead for him at the young women's spaghetti dinner in 2006. We were trying to raise money for girls' camp, so we had a spaghetti dinner and dessert auction. People kept buying desserts and giving them to the missionaries. One of the desserts was a cake that was decorated with shrek candy. He dared me to put it on my face, so I took the candy off the cake and, using the frosting as adhesive, stuck it to my forehead. I thought he was pretty cool right then, especially since I remember feeling super sick all night and that was the only time I smiled the whole time I was there. Later he put 3 of them on his face. He has such an awesome sense of humor.
12. Do you get along with his/her family?
Yep. I do have my favorites, but everyone is easy to get along with.
13. Do you trust this person?
He is my baby daddy, I guess I have to. I really do trust him though. Some people doubt his logical thought process and others think he's a little crazy, but I think he understands life better than most.
14. Do you see him/her as your partner in your future?
Yes, obviously. So I'm going to replace this question.
14. What is your favorite thing about this person?
Spiritually- His dedication to his covenants. Emotionally- This one's obvious, his sense of humor. Not a day goes by that that man doesn't make me laugh and smile. Physically- His butt, he could easily be a pants model, such a nice rear. He has super pretty eyes too. And his hair has so much volume. I could go on and on.
15. What is the best gift he/she gave you?
Well, we certainly have a beautiful child, but I think I gave that to him, I did work harder at getting him here. We dated long distance for a while in 2008, which happened to be the year I graduated from high school. Yea, Michael and I dated while I was still in high school ( I was already 18 though). He sent me a box full of things for a graduation present. I got 2 big hunk bars, they don't have those back east, a hairnet from his work, a book about spiritual experiences in temples, a pack of zebra pens, 2 of his toys from when he was a kid, a chicken and a horse that has flashlights in their mouths and made noises when you pulled their tails, a hot wheels car, and my dinosaur. The dinosaur is the best part. He gave each of his family members a dinosaur for Christmas that year. The couples got dinosaurs that matched. He had one left over, so he gave it to me. Michael's dinosaur is a velociraptor and mine is a t-rex. We still have them today, sitting in our kitchen.
16. What is one thing he/she does that gets on your nerves?
He tries to get me to eat foods that I don't think I'll like. I'm kind of a picky eater, and he wants me to try new things. I don't always want to try new things, but the part that bothers me is when he's right about me liking something I don't think I'll like until I try it and like it.
17. Where do you see each other 15 years from now?
That's so far away! I have a hard time see where we'll be 5 months from now. But I'll try. I think I'd be working at a vet clinic part time, and helping the kids with homework and sports. All our kids with love soccer, of course. Michael will be some hot shot business man, all sexy in a suit, working hard and supporting his family. We'll have 3 kids by then, and no more than that. I think we'll be in a real house by then. And we'll have a husky and a german shepherd.
18. What causes the most arguments?
We don't really fight. I get upset sometimes, but I'm an emotional person and it's not anything in particular that Michael does that makes me sad. Plus half our marriage I was pregnant, so that's not fair. Plus, if I said what really caused distress in our relationship I'd be in trouble. You'll just have to guess.
19. How long have you been together?
Forever. He's the man I've always dreamed of being with and I've forgotten my life before he was in it. The non-cheesy answer, for 6 months or so in 2008 and since May 2009, 2 years 10 months.
20. Are you married?
Yep.
1. Where did you meet?
We met on January 17, 2006 at my older sister's house on Oakdale Dr. in Clarksville, TN. Specifically, in the living room. He was there to teach me and my sister. His missionary companion was Elder Tauiautusa. They rode their bikes over, and it was a really hilly neighborhood and it rained all day, cold, wet, winter rain.
2. What was the first thought that went through your head when you met?
This is going to be interesting. To explain, I had just been baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints on the 14. The 2 missionaries that taught me and baptized me just went home the day or two before and now these 2 new guys were here to teach me and my sister the new member lesson. I wasn't super thrilled that the 2 people I'd grown close to spiritually were gone and now I was supposed to learn from these new guys... Oh and I remember thinking that his voice was a little weird.
3. Do you remember what he/she was wearing?
A suit, I'm pretty sure it was black. And he had black shoes. And his hair was parted and gelled. And he had a name tag.
4.Where was the first time you kissed this person?
In my driveway, leaning against his car on June 14, 2009. He came to visit me after a long distance relationship and getting to know each other through facebook. The visit was to "see some people from his mission" and it really turned out to be whether I was worth him moving out there to marry me. Oh, and I kissed him, for the record. Afterwords, we took a picture together with really goofy, cheesy smiles on our faces. I love that picture.
5. Where did you go for your first date?
It depends on what you consider a date. There were times when we were dating and he was in Idaho and I was in Tennessee that I would set up a blanket outside and talk to him for hours. If that was face to face then that's an awesome date. The first night he was in Tennessee to visit after his mission we went to McGregor Park aka the riverwalk and sat on a bench and chatted for about an hour. But he was super tired after driving 26 hours straight, right after leaving a family reunion, and having not slept for a long time. I think our first date was Tuesday when he picked me up at 6 am, I made him breakfast, we drove to Sewanee, TN and walked around the college campus there (absolutely amazing, every building is like a stone castle), hiked to a natural bridge, found a baby snapping turtle, drove to Alabama to make his roommate jealous, drove to Chattanooga, went to Lookout Mountain, went to Rock City (the gnomes were a little much), and finally ended up at our original destination- the stone door in Grundy County, hiked around there for a while then went to a waterfall he wanted to jump off of while on his mission, he jumped I swam and he almost died. I got home at 11 that night and I hoped that day was the beginning of many more adventures to come. Wow, I'd like to see someone top that for a first date... except he didn't walk me to the door.
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| Sewanee |
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| Natural Bridge |
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| Rock City, you can see 7 states from there! |
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| Stone door |
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| The waterfall that tried to kill Michael. |
6. How long did you know this person before you became a couple?
To be honest, I don't really remember when exactly we "became a couple" the first time... We met in 2006, he was in my ward for 4 months, I saw him once more at a musical fireside and talk for a couple minutes and in 2008 we started talking on facebook in January and maybe in March we started talking on the phone and long distance dating. So I'm gonna say 2 and a quarter years... is that fair?
7. How did he/she ask you out?
I'm pretty sure it was just implied...
8. Has this person ever proposed to you?
Yes, twice. I said no the first time and yes the second. The first time was after we had played soccer and he did something that made me super upset and he was concerned for our relationship. So he bought me ice cream and told me he had the ring with him. I wouldn't even let him talk to me alone. I wanted our proposal story to be better than that. The second time was a winner. I babysat that night and told him to meet me at my house after I got done with work. Then I went to his house and set up flower petals, a picnic on the floor (he had just moved in and had no furniture), and candles. Then he came over and we talked and ate and had fun, and at 3 in the morning on August 16, 2009 he pulled out the ring and said there couldn't be a better time. :]
9. Do you and this person have kids together?
No. We have one kid, and he is perfect.
10.Have you ever broken the law with this person?
Yes. Speeding on a number of occasions, breaking and entering, theft, and a whole bunch of not reporting underage drinking. Not that we were doing it, just not telling on other people doing it.
11. When was the first time you realized you liked this person?
It would have to be when I stuck the shrek candy on my forehead for him at the young women's spaghetti dinner in 2006. We were trying to raise money for girls' camp, so we had a spaghetti dinner and dessert auction. People kept buying desserts and giving them to the missionaries. One of the desserts was a cake that was decorated with shrek candy. He dared me to put it on my face, so I took the candy off the cake and, using the frosting as adhesive, stuck it to my forehead. I thought he was pretty cool right then, especially since I remember feeling super sick all night and that was the only time I smiled the whole time I was there. Later he put 3 of them on his face. He has such an awesome sense of humor.
12. Do you get along with his/her family?
Yep. I do have my favorites, but everyone is easy to get along with.
13. Do you trust this person?
He is my baby daddy, I guess I have to. I really do trust him though. Some people doubt his logical thought process and others think he's a little crazy, but I think he understands life better than most.
14. Do you see him/her as your partner in your future?
Yes, obviously. So I'm going to replace this question.
14. What is your favorite thing about this person?
Spiritually- His dedication to his covenants. Emotionally- This one's obvious, his sense of humor. Not a day goes by that that man doesn't make me laugh and smile. Physically- His butt, he could easily be a pants model, such a nice rear. He has super pretty eyes too. And his hair has so much volume. I could go on and on.
15. What is the best gift he/she gave you?
Well, we certainly have a beautiful child, but I think I gave that to him, I did work harder at getting him here. We dated long distance for a while in 2008, which happened to be the year I graduated from high school. Yea, Michael and I dated while I was still in high school ( I was already 18 though). He sent me a box full of things for a graduation present. I got 2 big hunk bars, they don't have those back east, a hairnet from his work, a book about spiritual experiences in temples, a pack of zebra pens, 2 of his toys from when he was a kid, a chicken and a horse that has flashlights in their mouths and made noises when you pulled their tails, a hot wheels car, and my dinosaur. The dinosaur is the best part. He gave each of his family members a dinosaur for Christmas that year. The couples got dinosaurs that matched. He had one left over, so he gave it to me. Michael's dinosaur is a velociraptor and mine is a t-rex. We still have them today, sitting in our kitchen.
16. What is one thing he/she does that gets on your nerves?
He tries to get me to eat foods that I don't think I'll like. I'm kind of a picky eater, and he wants me to try new things. I don't always want to try new things, but the part that bothers me is when he's right about me liking something I don't think I'll like until I try it and like it.
17. Where do you see each other 15 years from now?
That's so far away! I have a hard time see where we'll be 5 months from now. But I'll try. I think I'd be working at a vet clinic part time, and helping the kids with homework and sports. All our kids with love soccer, of course. Michael will be some hot shot business man, all sexy in a suit, working hard and supporting his family. We'll have 3 kids by then, and no more than that. I think we'll be in a real house by then. And we'll have a husky and a german shepherd.
18. What causes the most arguments?
We don't really fight. I get upset sometimes, but I'm an emotional person and it's not anything in particular that Michael does that makes me sad. Plus half our marriage I was pregnant, so that's not fair. Plus, if I said what really caused distress in our relationship I'd be in trouble. You'll just have to guess.
19. How long have you been together?
Forever. He's the man I've always dreamed of being with and I've forgotten my life before he was in it. The non-cheesy answer, for 6 months or so in 2008 and since May 2009, 2 years 10 months.
20. Are you married?
Yep.
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| I sure do love this guy :] |
Friday, October 21, 2011
A little under-appreciated
Let's take a minute here and focus on Michael. He is one good man and an even better husband. He catered to my every need when we were at the hospital. He has given our family stability with his hard work and determination. And recently, he has given me my sanity back with how helpful he is with Ivan. There have been 3 or 4 nights since the baby was born that Michael stays up with him and feeds him and changes him while letting me sleep. How cool is that? And yesterday he let me go out with a friend to get my nails done while he stayed at home with Ivan. Even when we're both home, Michael helps with diapers and feedings. He's the best. Oh and yesterday he turned 25! I'm so grateful for this man. He supports me in everything I do and understands me like no one else in the world can. I love him very much and wouldn't have chosen my life to go any other way. So thank you, Michael, for all that you do, who you are, and who you make me.
I am so happy I get to spend forever with you, Michael. You'll always be my favorite.
Sunday, October 16, 2011
Nana and Papa meet Ivan
First I wanna say that the first people to visit us were Ben and Natalie and Emma Millett on Friday the 30, the day Ivan was born. They kindly brought Michael Taco Bell. The next visitor we had was Brenda, Michael's twin sister. She came on Saturday and stayed the night and kindly brought Michael Wendy's.
My parents, who live in Tennessee, came to visit that week too. They came on Monday the 3rd and got to meet their fourth grand kid. Ivan is the fourth grand kid on my side and on Michael's side. Pretty cool. Monday was very exciting. I hadn't seen my parents since May and the thought of financially and physically being able to afford visiting TN again this year just really isn't happening. So I was super excited to see 2 of my favorite people and for them to meet my newest favorite person. Tuesday they went to the doctor's with us. Our pediatrician, Dr. Jones, is amazing. And Ivan's check up went great. He had only lost 2 ounces from what his birth weight was. Ivan never had any sign of jaundice and Dr. Jones is continually impressed with his muscle tone. After that appointment we went to bear world. After all, I was pretty impressed that my mom convinced my dad to come visit me. I am his favorite, but flying and driving and travelling really isn't his thing. Especially since they used to own land just out of Butte, Montana and all my dad wanted was to live in the west. So him coming to visit meant a lot and really is a big deal. My mom coming to visit is a big deal too, she tends to help more. :] So I wanted to show my parents the coolest thing around, and we have community cards that get us in for half price. They were blown away! I don't think my mom had ever seen elk before and there's just so many bears! In the gift shop they have about 20 flavors of fudge. My dad loves fudge. So the got some and got some for us too. Then we went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner and I'm pretty sure my parents were blown out of the water. Wednesday we were going to go to Yellowstone, but it was cold and rainy and I just didn't feel like sitting in a car for any amount of time. So we got my parents addicted to How I Met Your Mother. Did I mention how much we like this show? It's hilarious. Probably not the most appropriate thing we've ever watched, but hilarious. And my parents started looking at land out here. Not in Rexburg, but in Cheyenne, WY. They are thinking that my dad could go back to school and get his nurse practitioner degree and my mom would only have to work in the summer (and probably wouldn't ever leave the house in the winter). In Cheyenne there is a VA hospital, which is where they are working now so they could transfer fairly easily. Plus land is pretty cheap. That's the draw. Then they'd be pretty darn close to us. We'd like to end up in Fort Collins, CO not too far away. And discussion of that went on all week. I love my parents so much and I've decided if they hadn't been here for the first week of recovery that I would have died. Between being in loads of pain still, making me practically immobile, and having the "baby blues" hit me like a ton of bricks, I was having a hard time. It should be mandatory to have at least one family member, other than your husband, stay with you and help you for the first week after having a baby. I could have even used their help for another whole week to adjust to Michael being at work half the day. So thank you Mom and Dad for being awesome and being there for my and my little one when I needed you most. I know Michael appreciates it too cuz he didn't have to make me eggs and toast and bring me water when I needed it. My mom makes the best scrambled eggs I don't care what you say. Here's some pictures of Nana and Papa with Ivan and of bear world round 2.
Saturday, October 15, 2011
My First Child
Here's the whole story of Ivan's birth. This is going to have all the gross details, every last one of them, just a warning.
We're going to start on Thursday September 22. I had a doctor's appointment, they checked to see if and how far I was dilated and effaced and all that. Sadly, no progress. I hadn't felt any contractions and was doing everything I could think of to speed things up. I rode a bike for an hour, I walked a couple miles a day, I ate mango and pineapple, I took advice from friends and walked with one leg on the curb and the other on the road. I didn't try any of the laxatives, I was pretty nervous about spending a long time on the toilet, somehow that didn't sound fun. I continued to work as much and as hard as I could. And as far as my boss goes, I am one good worker. Back to the appointment... No progress and I was getting anxious. So the nurse practitioner asked the question "Do you want to be induced?" Well, YES! I was so done being pregnant and getting pretty nervous about how big this guy was gonna get. So we scheduled an appointment for Monday so I could see an actual doctor and have him tell me whether they could induce me on Tuesday or not.
Monday I go back and get checked and I was dilated to about a 2 or a 3 (his words). How exciting! Then I get asked that same question again... Do you want to be induced? Well... I'm not so sure this time around... I do a pretty good job of putting stressful things to the back of my mind, well at least the really big stuff, like the fact that I was having a baby. And there are some people that I talked to about that had nothing good to say about it. So I was a little less inclined to say I wanted that baby out of me right then. So the doctor told me to come back on Thursday if I hadn't had the baby yet and they would do a non stress test to see how everything was going.
Before we get to Thursday, let's take a minute and admire my accomplishments of the week of my due date. Monday: Michael had a little work barbecue thing at the park that we went to and I ran and kicked the soccer ball around for about a half hour. And that's after working that day too. Wednesday: On my due date, I worked at the clinic for 9 hours, was on my feet for 8.5 of it, and restrained some pretty beastly dogs. Not to mention all the other fun manual labor aspects of my job. And after that, I spent about 2 more hours deep cleaning my house for the third time that week. And then there's Thursday...
And now that it's Thursday, you get to hear about my third doctor's appointment within a week. That's a little ridiculous. I get there, and had actually convinced Michael to come with me... he seems to think the appointments are boring and doesn't like to go with me. I can't blame him, some stranger is gonna investigate my lady parts and he doesn't like that, well I don't like it either. Anyway, I get there and there's a pretty long wait, apparently some lady decided to have a problem having her baby and needed an emergency c-section (poor thing) but that meant the doctors were all out of the office and there was only one nurse practitioner there to see all the patients. When we finally got seen they did an ultrasound instead of a non stress test. Boy was I excited for an ultrasound! I had been wanting another since I was spoiled with my first 2 appointments including an ultrasound... that's what happens when you wait til you're 17 weeks to go to the doctor for the first time. But sadly I was told it wasn't necessary and they even tried to convince me it wasn't worth it cuz you wouldn't be able to see anything. Little did I know, they were right. He just looked like a huge blob in there. I saw lots of round stuff and some dark stuff and some lighter stuff, but I have no idea what I was looking at. During the ultrasound, they looked at the position of the baby (which was perfect), the placement of my placenta (which was where it needed to be), and how much amniotic fluid was in there with the baby (there was hardly any). The nurse gave me different scores for different things and I got a 0 for fluid. Kinda depressing when you go to the doctor and they give you a grade and that grade is not only failing but a complete 0. Awesome. And apparently that's kind of a big deal. So when the nurse practitioner came in, she checked me, yay fun. I was still at a 2 or a 3 (again her words). So she decided she was going to strip my membranes. If you don't know what that is, go look it up please, cuz it's kinda gross and painful. She didn't really give me any warning and definitely didn't give me a choice. We needed to get this birthing process underway for the sake of the baby. Right before she did that, she told me "This is going to be uncomfortable (really?) do you want to hold my hand?" How weird is that? For one, you're a woman. For two, you're putting your hand somewhere my husband hasn't even touched. For three, that's just plain weird. But it did hurt and I wish I would have held Michael's hand. After that, she was sure let me know she was concerned about the lack of fluid and the fact that I'm a day overdue. And here comes that question again. "Do you want to be induced?" Then she said how much bigger the baby was going to get every day and how dangerous it could be with less and less fluid. She scared me right into it. I was already nervous about how big he was gonna be, considering my size. Then she told us they could try and fit us in today or try really hard for Friday but definitely by Saturday. How scary! I didn't know she meant right then! So she left to try to get a hold of a doctor to get his approval and say on the situation. Half an hour later she came back and told us she'd give us a call when she had heard from the doctor.
So here's what we did... We packed some snacks, the binoculars, some drinks, brought the hospital bag, and we borrowed a pass to Yellowstone from our friends. We then went and drove to Yellowstone. The way we saw it, if I had to be induced there was no way I could go into labor that day or while we were driving, right? Don't tell my doctor about that one... On the way, probably half an hour out from reaching the park, the doctor calls. At the clinic I go to there are 3 doctors and 2 nurse practitioners. One doctor is really cool, he's older and totally not intimidating as anything but a doctor. One doctor is a little too young looking and doesn't really have the bedside manner of the first doctor. The last doctor is super old and really tall and altogether really scary and since he has so much experience, what he says goes. You rotate between all the doctors so you know everyone and any one of them could deliver your baby. Makes sense, but turns out it's pretty irritating to not see the same person every time. The third doctor is the one that called. He said I needed to go in that night at 9 and they would induce me. And we continued our drive. It was about 2 when we started our trip so we figured we could stay in the park until 7 or 7:30 and still make it to the hospital by 9. It was really beautiful. All the leaves were changing and there were animals all about. We saw some elk when we first got in the park, but didn't take any pictures because we figured the way we were planning on going we'd see plenty more. Then we decided instead of driving the loop of the park that we would drive part of the way through and come out the Grand Teton entrance. We saw some buffalo and an eagle and we finally broke our streak of seeing a bear at every trip to Yellowstone. I had never been in Grand Teton National Park, just driven close enough to see the mountains and turned around. And neither Michael nor I had ever seen the view of the mountains from Jenny Lake. So we went. Here's some pictures.
Back to the birth story. We got to the hospital a couple minutes before nine and wandered around the poorly laid out Madison Memorial Hospital looking for the labor and delivery section. There were signs and even an arrow pointing toward where we thought we should go. Apparently the ward is on the second floor, but he arrow did not say that. Thank goodness there were some housekeepers walking around that could see the confusion on our faces. When the doctor, we'll call him doc 3, called and told us to come in, he only said come in at 9 and we'll get things started. I didn't know what that meant, if we were going to be checking in and staying the night or what. Yep, we were staying the night. We registered and got put in the biggest room in the ward. The nurse came in and told me to get in the awful hospital gown and she hooked me up to the monitors that kept an eye on the baby's heart rate and on my contractions. The plan was that I was going to take this pill to help thin out my cervix and get more dilated so that in the morning I would be ready for a Pitocin drip. Well, Doc 3 came in around 9:30 and said I was having normal contractions about every 4 minutes (I had no idea and didn't really feel anything more than minor menstrual cramping, if only it stayed that way). So he took this crochet hook looking thing and broke my water. I've always thought that when my water broke I was going to feel something, like maybe I had just wet my pants or even just have the feeling of water leaving me. Nope, didn't feel a thing. And there really wasn't much water to be broken anyway. Have I mentioned how old doc 3 is? Super old. And he has some kind of tremors or shaking, whatever you call it, in his hands. Imagine someone who can't keep his hands still enough to drink from a glass without spilling and he is checking your dilation status every half hour. It sucked. Labor progressed pretty quickly from there, I think anyway. I went from being a 3 when I checked in to 6 by midnight and I had no idea just how painful it could be. This whole pregnancy I had told myself I'd like to try the whole natural birth thing and see how that goes. I always kept an open mind though. And I knew if it became too painful that I might not be able to finish the job and I wouldn't be a failure if I got pain meds or an epidural. In hindsight, I know why I live in this day and age, so that I can take advantage of the wonderful medical and technology advances that make our lives easier. So, with Michael looking at me so helplessly and like he was in as much pain as I was, I decided to get some pain medication. I called for the nurse and she explained my options. I opted for pentothal (I think that's what it is) which is a narcotic pain medication that is administered through your IV. I got that and felt about half as much pain as I had before. . . for a half an hour anyway. By 12:45 I thought I was going to explode. It was the worst pain of my life and I had no idea how to cope with it. Wish I would have taken a birthing class... So I called for the nurse again and asked for an epidural. The labor and delivery ward was full that night, lots of people having babies and apparently they all had something against October. 6 babies were born that night, which meant that there were a lot of busy people, including the anesthesiologist. She had just started the process of giving an epidural to another patient, so I had to wait. 45 agonizing minutes later, she finally came in. Then she took what seemed like forever (probably ten minutes) to explain the risks and to prep me for it. Then she asked me to do the hardest thing I've ever done up to that point. I had to remain completely motionless for her to place the catheter into my epidural space in my spine. I was having contractions every minute or so and if felt like an earthquake in my lady parts every time. Proudly I was able to do that... motivated only by the relief of pain and the future relief of pregnancy. Then everything was awesome. My legs went completely numb, well more like they had fallen asleep. So I could sort of feel when someone else was touching me, but it was that uncomfortable feeling of touching a body part that's asleep. I didn't feel any more contractions after that. Not a single bit. I didn't even feel my abdomen tightening at all.
Did I mention that you can't eat anything once they give you this? Lame. Even more lame, Michael was hungry and the nurse, who was super nice and Michael and Brenda actually know her relatives, asked him if he would like some toast. Yep, my husband ate 5 pieces of toast right in front of me while I was in labor. Well, at least he didn't leave me by myself. So by 2 o'clock I felt like I could actually get some rest and have a little more energy for getting that baby out. And I started to fall asleep. With the monitor that they use to watch the baby they are looking at the change in his heart rate. They want it to change a lot and to not be at a constant rate. So every time I got comfortable enough to fall asleep, his heart rate would level out and in would come a nurse to check me and the baby. Around 4 doc 3 came back and put a different monitor on me, well in me. These monitors were supposed to read my contractions and the baby's heart rate better because they were intrautero. I was all numbed up, so him putting those in didn't really effect me. Sure it bothered me cuz it was some strange man looking at my junk, but what can ya do. So 5:30 rolls around and I start feeling more of my contractions. The nurse comes in to check me and she decides I'm at about a 9 and a half and she tells me when I feel a contraction to start pushing. Thank goodness I had done Kegels before so I actually knew which muscles to use to have a successful push. And I'm pushing and pushing and 8 o'clock comes around, this meant a change in doctors. Yay! But I wasn't getting the first doctor with the awesome bedside manner and kind understanding that comes from seeing so many women in a kind of pain he'll never know. I got the second doctor. The young one that didn't seem super interested in having a conversation with you. But he was still better than doctor scary. He came in the room right around 8 checked me and checked the position of the baby and said that his head was turned sideways and wouldn't fit through the birth canal that way. At this point I think all of my epidural had worn off and I felt everything. It was awful. How does anyone do it without help? Kudos to you ladies, to include my mom, crazy woman! So I cried and cried for something to stop the pain and I got what I wanted... back to feeling nothing again. I'm so glad I did that, I didn't know what was about to happen. Doc 2 told me I had options. I could have help and he could put forceps in to turn the babies head and put him in the right position or we could be looking at a c-section. He knew I had been pushing for almost 3 hours and was worried if we didn't do something now that I'd use all my energy to get the head out and wouldn't be able to get the shoulders. I immediately told him I'd do anything to not have a c-section. He gloved up, they took the bed apart so everything would just fall into the trash and not on the bed, and I pushed that little guy out. The forceps that he used looked like giant metal spoons, I mean giant. He used 2, one for each side of Ivan's head and I'm pretty sure he helped pull him out too. Since I'd just had a second dose of an epidural, I didn't really feel any pain when he came out, just a lot of pressure and movement. I also didn't feel it when I tore all of my perineum and part of my rectum too. Well, it's not really that I tore my rectum, I just pushed so hard that the layers of my rectum separated and had to be sewn back together. During recovery, that was the worst part. He used 2 packs of suture to stitch me up, that likes 26 inches of suture material! After he did that, the nurses (2 of them) practically got on the bed with me and pushed so hard on my abdomen that everything I was supposed to leak out over the next few weeks all came out right then and there. Michael said it was gross and I won't go into any more detail than that. I didn't feel anything, still really drugged, and not having to worry about changing a pad every couple hours has been awesome. I've barely even spotted, I have to say that's the best thing that doctor could ever do for a woman. So let's look at the time here, doc 2 came in at 8, gloved up at 8:10 and we had a baby at 8:33. Why couldn't we have started that at 5:30?! I was so grateful that the doctors switched though, I think my chances of getting a c-section would have been about 80% higher if it had been him delivering for me. Plus, can you imagine how much worse my tear would have been if his shaky hands had been holding those forceps? I'm really not exaggerating with how bad it is.
There were so many people having babies there that we ended up staying Thursday night and Friday night in the labor and delivery room we checked into instead of being moved to the mother baby unit on Friday. We were ok with this. And we were finally able to sleep after not sleeping at all Thursday night. The room we were in didn't have a DVD player and it had an old TV in it that didn't have HDMI compatibility. This really sucked for Michael, I was a little preoccupied. Michael and I had been planning on watching How I Met Your Mother, we had borrowed it from our friends and had 4 seasons of it. That's a good way to pass the time, right? Except they were all on DVD, not only that, an entire season is on one disc. So it takes more than a DVD player, well the one we have, to read it. Michael was going to get the playstation, then we could watch that and he could play call of duty and we'd have options. But no luck. Thank goodness for cable. We don't have cable or satellite right now, too expensive, so this was a real treat to us. And the Animal Planet channel always has something interesting on in the middle of the night. The food there was really great though. People talk about hospital food being super gross, but I was way impressed. And it's a good thing the food was great cuz I sure wasn't hungry. I had no appetite at all after having been in labor for 12 hours and pushing for a fourth of that. And if it hadn't tasted so good, I wouldn't have eaten it. They gave me and Michael a steak and shrimp dinner for Friday night. It was pretty good, it would have been better if I would have eaten it when they brought it instead of 3 hours later. And they served it with raspberry cheesecake. That is by far the best cheesecake I've ever had in my entire life. It's probably the best dessert I've ever had ever. Yea, it was that good. Our meals even included miniature sparkling cider!
After the epidural wore off, the nurse came in to help me to the bathroom and get the sheets changed on my bed since we were staying the night. And she was going to help me shower if I wanted it. I got out of bed as slowly as I could, using the puppy pads they had on the bed as a Sumo wrestler's diaper, and I almost passed out. I sat back down and almost passed out again. I was a little, maybe a lot, incontinent and went all over the place and almost passed out. I tried to stand up with 2 nurses supporting me and almost passed out. They put me in a wheelchair so they could change the sheets and I almost passed out. And I did have to use the bathroom still, nurses orders. So they wheeled me ten feet across the room and helped me shuffle from the wheelchair to the toilet and I still almost passed out. I wanted a shower way bad considering just how gross I was, but all I got was a good wipe down by the super nice nurses that didn't want me to pass out on their shift. The whole bathroom ordeal, 5 hours after giving birth, took 45 minutes. And I was so worn out after that that I felt like I'd just given birth again. That night went well though. I had the nurse take Ivan at about midnight, after he had just eaten, so I could sleep. I wanted to sleep through one feeding and have them give him a bottle then bring him back and wake me up the next time he got hungry. Well, apparently he doesn't like anything but momma and he wouldn't eat the bottle. So at 3 he came back and ate and they took him again til he was hungry again.
I wasn't sure how long we were allowed to stay in the hospital, so we thought 2 nights was it and that we were going home Saturday afternoon. Doc 2 came in to check on me Saturday morning and asked what I wanted to do, so we stayed another night. And thank goodness for that! Me and Michael were able to switch from labor and delivery to the mother baby unit. Yay! They had a DVD player there, but by now we're addicted to Animal Planet and nothing else matters, well except that it was Saturday and now we could watch all the college football games. They have a "daddy fridge" there too. It's a fridge packed with pudding, yogurt, fruit juices and all sorts of stuff to snack on. While I could order anything I wanted from the cafeteria at any time, Michael had to find his own food. And I'll admit, I ordered food and ate just a little and gave the rest to Michael. He's a hungry guy. And he's got good friends that brought him food too. The room we were in there was a little smaller, but the bed was about a foot lower. The bed in the L&D was so high I had to use a stool and stand on my tip toes just to jump to kneel on the bed. It was a little ridiculous and made me not want to get up and walk around or even use the bathroom. So a lower bed that didn't need a stool helped me to get up and walk around more. And this room had a bathtub with the shower so I didn't have to ask the nurses if the jacuzzi was available, I could soak in my own room whenever I wanted. That pretty much ends the birth story and my hospital stay.
We're going to start on Thursday September 22. I had a doctor's appointment, they checked to see if and how far I was dilated and effaced and all that. Sadly, no progress. I hadn't felt any contractions and was doing everything I could think of to speed things up. I rode a bike for an hour, I walked a couple miles a day, I ate mango and pineapple, I took advice from friends and walked with one leg on the curb and the other on the road. I didn't try any of the laxatives, I was pretty nervous about spending a long time on the toilet, somehow that didn't sound fun. I continued to work as much and as hard as I could. And as far as my boss goes, I am one good worker. Back to the appointment... No progress and I was getting anxious. So the nurse practitioner asked the question "Do you want to be induced?" Well, YES! I was so done being pregnant and getting pretty nervous about how big this guy was gonna get. So we scheduled an appointment for Monday so I could see an actual doctor and have him tell me whether they could induce me on Tuesday or not.
Monday I go back and get checked and I was dilated to about a 2 or a 3 (his words). How exciting! Then I get asked that same question again... Do you want to be induced? Well... I'm not so sure this time around... I do a pretty good job of putting stressful things to the back of my mind, well at least the really big stuff, like the fact that I was having a baby. And there are some people that I talked to about that had nothing good to say about it. So I was a little less inclined to say I wanted that baby out of me right then. So the doctor told me to come back on Thursday if I hadn't had the baby yet and they would do a non stress test to see how everything was going.
Before we get to Thursday, let's take a minute and admire my accomplishments of the week of my due date. Monday: Michael had a little work barbecue thing at the park that we went to and I ran and kicked the soccer ball around for about a half hour. And that's after working that day too. Wednesday: On my due date, I worked at the clinic for 9 hours, was on my feet for 8.5 of it, and restrained some pretty beastly dogs. Not to mention all the other fun manual labor aspects of my job. And after that, I spent about 2 more hours deep cleaning my house for the third time that week. And then there's Thursday...
And now that it's Thursday, you get to hear about my third doctor's appointment within a week. That's a little ridiculous. I get there, and had actually convinced Michael to come with me... he seems to think the appointments are boring and doesn't like to go with me. I can't blame him, some stranger is gonna investigate my lady parts and he doesn't like that, well I don't like it either. Anyway, I get there and there's a pretty long wait, apparently some lady decided to have a problem having her baby and needed an emergency c-section (poor thing) but that meant the doctors were all out of the office and there was only one nurse practitioner there to see all the patients. When we finally got seen they did an ultrasound instead of a non stress test. Boy was I excited for an ultrasound! I had been wanting another since I was spoiled with my first 2 appointments including an ultrasound... that's what happens when you wait til you're 17 weeks to go to the doctor for the first time. But sadly I was told it wasn't necessary and they even tried to convince me it wasn't worth it cuz you wouldn't be able to see anything. Little did I know, they were right. He just looked like a huge blob in there. I saw lots of round stuff and some dark stuff and some lighter stuff, but I have no idea what I was looking at. During the ultrasound, they looked at the position of the baby (which was perfect), the placement of my placenta (which was where it needed to be), and how much amniotic fluid was in there with the baby (there was hardly any). The nurse gave me different scores for different things and I got a 0 for fluid. Kinda depressing when you go to the doctor and they give you a grade and that grade is not only failing but a complete 0. Awesome. And apparently that's kind of a big deal. So when the nurse practitioner came in, she checked me, yay fun. I was still at a 2 or a 3 (again her words). So she decided she was going to strip my membranes. If you don't know what that is, go look it up please, cuz it's kinda gross and painful. She didn't really give me any warning and definitely didn't give me a choice. We needed to get this birthing process underway for the sake of the baby. Right before she did that, she told me "This is going to be uncomfortable (really?) do you want to hold my hand?" How weird is that? For one, you're a woman. For two, you're putting your hand somewhere my husband hasn't even touched. For three, that's just plain weird. But it did hurt and I wish I would have held Michael's hand. After that, she was sure let me know she was concerned about the lack of fluid and the fact that I'm a day overdue. And here comes that question again. "Do you want to be induced?" Then she said how much bigger the baby was going to get every day and how dangerous it could be with less and less fluid. She scared me right into it. I was already nervous about how big he was gonna be, considering my size. Then she told us they could try and fit us in today or try really hard for Friday but definitely by Saturday. How scary! I didn't know she meant right then! So she left to try to get a hold of a doctor to get his approval and say on the situation. Half an hour later she came back and told us she'd give us a call when she had heard from the doctor.
So here's what we did... We packed some snacks, the binoculars, some drinks, brought the hospital bag, and we borrowed a pass to Yellowstone from our friends. We then went and drove to Yellowstone. The way we saw it, if I had to be induced there was no way I could go into labor that day or while we were driving, right? Don't tell my doctor about that one... On the way, probably half an hour out from reaching the park, the doctor calls. At the clinic I go to there are 3 doctors and 2 nurse practitioners. One doctor is really cool, he's older and totally not intimidating as anything but a doctor. One doctor is a little too young looking and doesn't really have the bedside manner of the first doctor. The last doctor is super old and really tall and altogether really scary and since he has so much experience, what he says goes. You rotate between all the doctors so you know everyone and any one of them could deliver your baby. Makes sense, but turns out it's pretty irritating to not see the same person every time. The third doctor is the one that called. He said I needed to go in that night at 9 and they would induce me. And we continued our drive. It was about 2 when we started our trip so we figured we could stay in the park until 7 or 7:30 and still make it to the hospital by 9. It was really beautiful. All the leaves were changing and there were animals all about. We saw some elk when we first got in the park, but didn't take any pictures because we figured the way we were planning on going we'd see plenty more. Then we decided instead of driving the loop of the park that we would drive part of the way through and come out the Grand Teton entrance. We saw some buffalo and an eagle and we finally broke our streak of seeing a bear at every trip to Yellowstone. I had never been in Grand Teton National Park, just driven close enough to see the mountains and turned around. And neither Michael nor I had ever seen the view of the mountains from Jenny Lake. So we went. Here's some pictures.
Back to the birth story. We got to the hospital a couple minutes before nine and wandered around the poorly laid out Madison Memorial Hospital looking for the labor and delivery section. There were signs and even an arrow pointing toward where we thought we should go. Apparently the ward is on the second floor, but he arrow did not say that. Thank goodness there were some housekeepers walking around that could see the confusion on our faces. When the doctor, we'll call him doc 3, called and told us to come in, he only said come in at 9 and we'll get things started. I didn't know what that meant, if we were going to be checking in and staying the night or what. Yep, we were staying the night. We registered and got put in the biggest room in the ward. The nurse came in and told me to get in the awful hospital gown and she hooked me up to the monitors that kept an eye on the baby's heart rate and on my contractions. The plan was that I was going to take this pill to help thin out my cervix and get more dilated so that in the morning I would be ready for a Pitocin drip. Well, Doc 3 came in around 9:30 and said I was having normal contractions about every 4 minutes (I had no idea and didn't really feel anything more than minor menstrual cramping, if only it stayed that way). So he took this crochet hook looking thing and broke my water. I've always thought that when my water broke I was going to feel something, like maybe I had just wet my pants or even just have the feeling of water leaving me. Nope, didn't feel a thing. And there really wasn't much water to be broken anyway. Have I mentioned how old doc 3 is? Super old. And he has some kind of tremors or shaking, whatever you call it, in his hands. Imagine someone who can't keep his hands still enough to drink from a glass without spilling and he is checking your dilation status every half hour. It sucked. Labor progressed pretty quickly from there, I think anyway. I went from being a 3 when I checked in to 6 by midnight and I had no idea just how painful it could be. This whole pregnancy I had told myself I'd like to try the whole natural birth thing and see how that goes. I always kept an open mind though. And I knew if it became too painful that I might not be able to finish the job and I wouldn't be a failure if I got pain meds or an epidural. In hindsight, I know why I live in this day and age, so that I can take advantage of the wonderful medical and technology advances that make our lives easier. So, with Michael looking at me so helplessly and like he was in as much pain as I was, I decided to get some pain medication. I called for the nurse and she explained my options. I opted for pentothal (I think that's what it is) which is a narcotic pain medication that is administered through your IV. I got that and felt about half as much pain as I had before. . . for a half an hour anyway. By 12:45 I thought I was going to explode. It was the worst pain of my life and I had no idea how to cope with it. Wish I would have taken a birthing class... So I called for the nurse again and asked for an epidural. The labor and delivery ward was full that night, lots of people having babies and apparently they all had something against October. 6 babies were born that night, which meant that there were a lot of busy people, including the anesthesiologist. She had just started the process of giving an epidural to another patient, so I had to wait. 45 agonizing minutes later, she finally came in. Then she took what seemed like forever (probably ten minutes) to explain the risks and to prep me for it. Then she asked me to do the hardest thing I've ever done up to that point. I had to remain completely motionless for her to place the catheter into my epidural space in my spine. I was having contractions every minute or so and if felt like an earthquake in my lady parts every time. Proudly I was able to do that... motivated only by the relief of pain and the future relief of pregnancy. Then everything was awesome. My legs went completely numb, well more like they had fallen asleep. So I could sort of feel when someone else was touching me, but it was that uncomfortable feeling of touching a body part that's asleep. I didn't feel any more contractions after that. Not a single bit. I didn't even feel my abdomen tightening at all.
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| I can't believe he took this picture of me. And I can't believe I put it on here. |
Did I mention that you can't eat anything once they give you this? Lame. Even more lame, Michael was hungry and the nurse, who was super nice and Michael and Brenda actually know her relatives, asked him if he would like some toast. Yep, my husband ate 5 pieces of toast right in front of me while I was in labor. Well, at least he didn't leave me by myself. So by 2 o'clock I felt like I could actually get some rest and have a little more energy for getting that baby out. And I started to fall asleep. With the monitor that they use to watch the baby they are looking at the change in his heart rate. They want it to change a lot and to not be at a constant rate. So every time I got comfortable enough to fall asleep, his heart rate would level out and in would come a nurse to check me and the baby. Around 4 doc 3 came back and put a different monitor on me, well in me. These monitors were supposed to read my contractions and the baby's heart rate better because they were intrautero. I was all numbed up, so him putting those in didn't really effect me. Sure it bothered me cuz it was some strange man looking at my junk, but what can ya do. So 5:30 rolls around and I start feeling more of my contractions. The nurse comes in to check me and she decides I'm at about a 9 and a half and she tells me when I feel a contraction to start pushing. Thank goodness I had done Kegels before so I actually knew which muscles to use to have a successful push. And I'm pushing and pushing and 8 o'clock comes around, this meant a change in doctors. Yay! But I wasn't getting the first doctor with the awesome bedside manner and kind understanding that comes from seeing so many women in a kind of pain he'll never know. I got the second doctor. The young one that didn't seem super interested in having a conversation with you. But he was still better than doctor scary. He came in the room right around 8 checked me and checked the position of the baby and said that his head was turned sideways and wouldn't fit through the birth canal that way. At this point I think all of my epidural had worn off and I felt everything. It was awful. How does anyone do it without help? Kudos to you ladies, to include my mom, crazy woman! So I cried and cried for something to stop the pain and I got what I wanted... back to feeling nothing again. I'm so glad I did that, I didn't know what was about to happen. Doc 2 told me I had options. I could have help and he could put forceps in to turn the babies head and put him in the right position or we could be looking at a c-section. He knew I had been pushing for almost 3 hours and was worried if we didn't do something now that I'd use all my energy to get the head out and wouldn't be able to get the shoulders. I immediately told him I'd do anything to not have a c-section. He gloved up, they took the bed apart so everything would just fall into the trash and not on the bed, and I pushed that little guy out. The forceps that he used looked like giant metal spoons, I mean giant. He used 2, one for each side of Ivan's head and I'm pretty sure he helped pull him out too. Since I'd just had a second dose of an epidural, I didn't really feel any pain when he came out, just a lot of pressure and movement. I also didn't feel it when I tore all of my perineum and part of my rectum too. Well, it's not really that I tore my rectum, I just pushed so hard that the layers of my rectum separated and had to be sewn back together. During recovery, that was the worst part. He used 2 packs of suture to stitch me up, that likes 26 inches of suture material! After he did that, the nurses (2 of them) practically got on the bed with me and pushed so hard on my abdomen that everything I was supposed to leak out over the next few weeks all came out right then and there. Michael said it was gross and I won't go into any more detail than that. I didn't feel anything, still really drugged, and not having to worry about changing a pad every couple hours has been awesome. I've barely even spotted, I have to say that's the best thing that doctor could ever do for a woman. So let's look at the time here, doc 2 came in at 8, gloved up at 8:10 and we had a baby at 8:33. Why couldn't we have started that at 5:30?! I was so grateful that the doctors switched though, I think my chances of getting a c-section would have been about 80% higher if it had been him delivering for me. Plus, can you imagine how much worse my tear would have been if his shaky hands had been holding those forceps? I'm really not exaggerating with how bad it is.
There were so many people having babies there that we ended up staying Thursday night and Friday night in the labor and delivery room we checked into instead of being moved to the mother baby unit on Friday. We were ok with this. And we were finally able to sleep after not sleeping at all Thursday night. The room we were in didn't have a DVD player and it had an old TV in it that didn't have HDMI compatibility. This really sucked for Michael, I was a little preoccupied. Michael and I had been planning on watching How I Met Your Mother, we had borrowed it from our friends and had 4 seasons of it. That's a good way to pass the time, right? Except they were all on DVD, not only that, an entire season is on one disc. So it takes more than a DVD player, well the one we have, to read it. Michael was going to get the playstation, then we could watch that and he could play call of duty and we'd have options. But no luck. Thank goodness for cable. We don't have cable or satellite right now, too expensive, so this was a real treat to us. And the Animal Planet channel always has something interesting on in the middle of the night. The food there was really great though. People talk about hospital food being super gross, but I was way impressed. And it's a good thing the food was great cuz I sure wasn't hungry. I had no appetite at all after having been in labor for 12 hours and pushing for a fourth of that. And if it hadn't tasted so good, I wouldn't have eaten it. They gave me and Michael a steak and shrimp dinner for Friday night. It was pretty good, it would have been better if I would have eaten it when they brought it instead of 3 hours later. And they served it with raspberry cheesecake. That is by far the best cheesecake I've ever had in my entire life. It's probably the best dessert I've ever had ever. Yea, it was that good. Our meals even included miniature sparkling cider!
After the epidural wore off, the nurse came in to help me to the bathroom and get the sheets changed on my bed since we were staying the night. And she was going to help me shower if I wanted it. I got out of bed as slowly as I could, using the puppy pads they had on the bed as a Sumo wrestler's diaper, and I almost passed out. I sat back down and almost passed out again. I was a little, maybe a lot, incontinent and went all over the place and almost passed out. I tried to stand up with 2 nurses supporting me and almost passed out. They put me in a wheelchair so they could change the sheets and I almost passed out. And I did have to use the bathroom still, nurses orders. So they wheeled me ten feet across the room and helped me shuffle from the wheelchair to the toilet and I still almost passed out. I wanted a shower way bad considering just how gross I was, but all I got was a good wipe down by the super nice nurses that didn't want me to pass out on their shift. The whole bathroom ordeal, 5 hours after giving birth, took 45 minutes. And I was so worn out after that that I felt like I'd just given birth again. That night went well though. I had the nurse take Ivan at about midnight, after he had just eaten, so I could sleep. I wanted to sleep through one feeding and have them give him a bottle then bring him back and wake me up the next time he got hungry. Well, apparently he doesn't like anything but momma and he wouldn't eat the bottle. So at 3 he came back and ate and they took him again til he was hungry again.
I wasn't sure how long we were allowed to stay in the hospital, so we thought 2 nights was it and that we were going home Saturday afternoon. Doc 2 came in to check on me Saturday morning and asked what I wanted to do, so we stayed another night. And thank goodness for that! Me and Michael were able to switch from labor and delivery to the mother baby unit. Yay! They had a DVD player there, but by now we're addicted to Animal Planet and nothing else matters, well except that it was Saturday and now we could watch all the college football games. They have a "daddy fridge" there too. It's a fridge packed with pudding, yogurt, fruit juices and all sorts of stuff to snack on. While I could order anything I wanted from the cafeteria at any time, Michael had to find his own food. And I'll admit, I ordered food and ate just a little and gave the rest to Michael. He's a hungry guy. And he's got good friends that brought him food too. The room we were in there was a little smaller, but the bed was about a foot lower. The bed in the L&D was so high I had to use a stool and stand on my tip toes just to jump to kneel on the bed. It was a little ridiculous and made me not want to get up and walk around or even use the bathroom. So a lower bed that didn't need a stool helped me to get up and walk around more. And this room had a bathtub with the shower so I didn't have to ask the nurses if the jacuzzi was available, I could soak in my own room whenever I wanted. That pretty much ends the birth story and my hospital stay.
Friday, October 14, 2011
Ivan is 2 weeks!
At birth Ivan weighed 7 pounds 8 ounces and was 19.5 inches long. At his first check up, when he was 3 days old he weighed 7 pounds 6 ounces and was 19.75 inches long. At 2 weeks Ivan weighs 8 pounds 3 ounces and is 20 inches long. He's a growing boy! Oh, and he's rolled over 4 times already, no joke.
Just thought I'd say thank you to everyone for the wonderfully cute outfits, toys, bottles, and diapers and wipes that have been given to us. It is much appreciated. Oh and the super cute blankets, can't forget those. :]
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
Well that was fun
After 9 months and 2 days, after 12 hours of labor, after 2 and a half hours of pushing, we finally got the cute baby we were hoping for. Another blog to come with all the real details... as soon as I find time.
Ivan Tyler Wampler
Born - September 30, 2011 at 8:33 am
Weighing - 7 lbs 8.3 oz
Length - 19.5 in
Cuteness - The mostest!
Yep, he's a keeper.
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